Just over three years ago, Tim Brady, Alan Louie, and I approached Paul Graham with the idea of creating a "Y Combinator for education." We were prepared for summary rejection. Paul does not hold back if he thinks an idea is bad, and we had serious reservations of our own. Was a vertical accelerator a good idea? Were there enough edtech companies to populate one? Did we know enough about accelerators to run one? As it turns out, Paul was not only enthusiastic about the idea, he offered to help us get started by showing us how YC works, by sharing great edtech companies with us, and by helping Imagine K12 launch. He also helped us pick our name!

A short time later Imagine K12 was born, and we were live with a website, an online application, and a really, really bad logo:

Despite the logo and hastily generated website, the applicants began to show up. Our first cohort launched that summer, and now five cohorts later we have worked with 54 great companies, the vast majority of which are still alive (sadly, six are no longer operating). Three years into this venture, so many things are new and different that a moment of reflection seems deserved. Let’s start with the overall environment.

Education TechnologyIt is an overstatement to say that edtech has been transformed over the past three years, but there is no doubt that change is happening rapidly. We take little credit for this change, except perhaps the amazing proliferation of new edtech accelerators that we seem to have launched. (There are now twelve.) But equally impressive is the growing reach of edtech companies. MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) are serving a global audience via providers like Udacity and Coursera. Tools like Edmodo and Imagine K12’s own ClassDojo have enjoyed impressive viral spread throughout the US school system, and there was even an edtech IPO (Chegg).

The country is moving shakily towards adoption of the Common Core, and the government seems committed to true broadband connectivity via the ConnectEd initiative (supported by industry’s Education Superhighway). One-to-one classes (where every student has a laptop, iPad, or other device) are increasingly common, although the economics of implementation means that more often than not these classes are found only in the wealthiest schools. And innovative teaching methods enabled by technology, from the flipped classroom to hybrid models, continue their spread.

With the edtech landscape shifting and changing, Imagine K12 has not remained static either.

Our TeamWe are still three partners, but our friend and original cofounder Alan Louie is no longer one of them. Alan left Imagine K12 to focus on literacy and early childhood education, and our first employee, Karen Lien, was promoted to partner. We also created a new position, manager of educational partnerships, and Jonathan Jew-Lim has done a fantastic job in the role. At the same time, our program has significantly evolved.

Our ProgramThe basic structure, derived from YC, has not changed. We continue to attract great speakers like PG, Jeff Weiner, Dan Rosensweig, and Reid Hoffman to our weekly dinners. We have added an Educator Demo Dayearly in the program where founders demo/pitch their products to an audience of teachers, principals, and administrators.

The program itself now runs only once a year in the fall, rather than twice in the winter and summer. Demo day is in January followed by rolling admissions for the next fall’s session. We also raised a Start Fund which writes an $80,000 note to each company accepted to Imagine K12. Finally, we are about to move offices from Palo Alto to Redwood City (thanks for three great years, AOL).

Our ResultsImagine K12 companies have had a serious impact on the world of education. ClassDojo is used in hundreds of thousands of classrooms, as are Remind101 and Socrative. Hapara is used in thousands of schools around the world and CodeHS is rapidly changing how programming is taught in middle schools and high schools around the country. Bloomboard and TeachBoost are professional development platforms of the future used to help teachers improve, and Panorama Education provides tools that allow schools to measure their own performance and use that knowledge to improve.

These are just a few examples of the dozens of Imagine K12 companies who have raised tens of millions of dollars and most importantly are making a difference for schools, teachers, and children around the US and the world. Actually, upon reflection, that was the goal all along.

We are proud to introduce the 13 companies that just graduated from Imagine K12’s fifth cohort. The companies from our Fall 2013 session presented at Demo Day on January 14th. We are now considering applications for our sixth cohort and will accept companies on a rolling basis. We will begin holding office hours and working with accepted companies even before our annual program begins in September.

The Fall 2013 cohort was an exceptional one, including several companies that achieved ramen profitability by Demo Day. All of the companies are launched and have achieved impressive traction. They comprise an impressive range of ideas, from programming courses for kids to enrollment tools for education administrators. Here is a brief summary of each company. More information is available via the link above as well as on each website.

Cellabus is a Mobile Device Management Platform for Education that helps schools manage large numbers of different types of devices in diverse settings.

Class Central is a search engine for Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs).

Classroom IQ is a cloud-based platform for managing open-response questions.

Classwork replaces pencil and paper in 21st century classrooms. Students write their work – math problems, drawings, text, etc. – on Classwork whiteboards.

DeansList is a new gradebook that helps schools assess critical “soft skills” like perseverance, diligence, leadership, teamwork and grit.

Edoome turns the classroom into an online community to connect teachers, students and their parents so they can communicate and collaborate in an easy and secure way.

EDpuzzle allows teachers to create a personalized lesson from any video.

Front Row is math practice for 21st century classrooms: adaptive, gamified, and data-driven.

Geddit is classroom feedback that starts with students and gives teachers the real-time feedback they need to address each student’s individual needs.

Kaymbu is an iPad-based documentation system that allows teachers to capture the essence of classroom activities and strengthen relationships between home and school.

Kodable is a curriculum introducing kids aged 5 and up to the basics of programming in a fun game.

Panorama Education is a survey tool used in more than 4,500 schools for data analytics and collecting feedback from students, parents, and teachers.

Our application for the 2014 cohort is now live. As noted above, admissions will be done on a rolling basis, so it is advantageous to apply early not only to reserve a place in the 20 companies we will accept per year, but because admitted companies immediately get funding and advice, as well as access to Imagine K12’s extensive networks of founders and educators.